Lucky I didn't pledge to eat my shorts
Well well. On Thursday night's election results programme John Reid refused to answer questions about whether he'd run for the Labour leadership insisting that, as he'd always said, he'd only gve the answer after Tony Blair had resigned. I, somewhat riskily, said that I'd eat my hat on camera if he ended up running. If someone had suggested he'd resign from the Cabinet I might have pledged to eat my shorts. Lucky I didn't because that's what he's just done on The Politics Show.
The post-Blair world is now shaping up. John Reid's announcement does not just confirm that Gordon Brown will not face a Blairite challenger and is certain to be our next Prime Minister. It gives Brown a much freeer hand than expected to shape his Cabinet. In particular, you should put your money on Alastair Darling as Chancellor. It was only the "too many Scots at the top" problem that produced talk about Jack Straw or Ed Balls getting the job.
I'm 
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A resignation also puts Reid in a good position to go for the party leadership should Labour lose the next general election.
Tony Blair said at PMQs yesterday that British troops shouldn't leave Iraq "before the job is done". So why is he leaving office before the job is done?